Seize the 21st Century Staffing Model
by David Earle

Is it absurd to suggest that the traditional staffing model is dying? After all, staffing has always been, and will always be, about finding and hiring the best candidates to fill jobs. What has changed about that, or about the skills required to do it well? In one sense, little.

Traditional skills remain vital to success, but what has undeniably changed, are the additional competencies required to produce superior staffing results on an enterprise scale. For example, mastery of:

• Complex computer hardware and software systems
• Internet sourcing techniques
• Database optimization and management
• Comprehensive efficiency and effectiveness metrics
• C-suite and board-level communication
• Corporate economics.

And these results must be produced in an increasingly competitive marketplace characterized by:

• Rapid change
• Skill imbalances
• New, rapidly evolving recruiting channels
• Multiple outsourcing options
• Unprecedented corporate transparency
• Decreasing worker loyalty
• Increasing worker mobility
• New working environments and arrangements.

Recruiting within the traditional model remains with us; small companies with modest hiring needs can still use it effectively. But larger companies cannot. For them, efficient and effective staffing requires a redefinition of roles and responsibilities. We often use an accounting analogy. The old model in that profession was bookkeeping, with expertise embodied in the CPA. Then the need arose to manage complex corporate assets and money flows. This required expertise in money management, financing instruments, currency exchange and risk management. Professional training now had to include an MBA and often a law degree. And so, corporate accounting became corporate finance.

Staffing’s New Roles and Responsibilities

The 21^st century staffing model has three characteristics: 

• A full range of performance metrics and measurements
• A thorough grounding in business
• Technological sophistication.

Measurement and Metrics - The traditional staffing model was developed before human capital management became a business school topic and before its full impact on corporate performance was understood. As long as seats were filled, budgets were met and there was an adequate choice of candidates, senior managers didn’t pay much attention. Extensive metrics were not demanded, so they were not kept. To this day, that pattern predominates. Most companies still keep only rudimentary data on efficiency and effectiveness.

Corporate Recruiting Report

Corporate Recruiting Report

Data and more data drive the 21^st century staffing model. The ten metrics in the chart above are only the beginning. There are additional metrics for quality of hire, retention, turnover, marketing efficiency and workforce planning. Together these reflect management’s response to an increasingly volatile and competitive business climate, one which raises the bar for corporate success considerably. Best-in-class performance now requires that

• All processes be measured so they can be managed
• Improved efficiency be a continuous process, not a one-time event
• Outsourcing be considered for every non-critical transactional function
• All expenses and investments be directly linked to bottom-line results

Measuring What Matters - Not only does the change in models mandate a change in measurement emphasis, it also mandates an expansion in the type of information that needs to be collected and analyzed. For example, if the CEO told you tomorrow that for the next three years the company’s compound growth target was 20% on a current revenue base of $6 billion produced by 46,000 employees in 21 countries; and if he also told you that his special concern was the readiness of the company’s top 200 managers, for which you were now personally responsible, reporting directly to him; could your department handle the assignment?

Here is the menu of information required to do so:

• Organization charts - Comprehensive maps of both today’s and tomorrow’s organization.
   
• Critical Skills Inventory - Identification of the critical skills necessary to run the enterprise, including lists of current staff, locations, demographics, turnover rates and time-to-replace figures.
   
• Readiness Assessments - Personal dossiers of the knowledge, skills, abilities, strengths, weaknesses, prior assignments, personal characteristics, personal networks, networking ability, and leadership qualities of each internal replacement candidate.
   
• Development Plans - A job development plan for each individual, including job rotations, formal education, coaching and mentoring, stretch projects, and compensation; plus a list of back-up candidates for those who may not make the grade or be hired away; plus a dashboard that sums all this up for the CEO.
   
• Workforce Projections - Staffing requirements, locations and timetables for hitting sales targets of $8.4 billion, $10 billion and $12 billion over the next three years.
   
• Cultural Analysis - Assessments of shifts in cultural gravity as the workforce grows and the impact of those shifts on governance, compensation, advancement and retention.
• Training and Learning Analysis - Assessments of the relevance and efficiency of the current enterprise training curriculum and its delivery.
   
• Job Market Analysis - Analysis of current and projected labor markets by geography, job level and skill level, factoring in moves by competitors.
   
• Partnership Analysis - Understanding the quality of key relationships with internal operating managers and hiring managers to determine which need improvement and realignment.
   
• Brand Analysis - Understanding what your employer brand means in the marketplace and how candidates respond to it.
   
• Sourcing Analysis - Efficiency and effectiveness comparisons for all sourcing channels to determine which are most efficient and effective.
   
• Staffing Efficiency Metrics - At least three years of comparative internal trend data - time, cost, funnel ratios, etc.
   
• Job Competency Analysis - Creation of job postings that stand out from the tens of millions of competing postings on the Internet to attract the most qualified and discourage the less qualified.
   
• Staffing Effectiveness Metrics - At least three years of internal data covering candidate quality, hiring manager satisfaction and retention.
   
• Structural Analysis - Evaluation of the impact of staffing process and structure on growth. Will additional decentralization be required? Which functions will be affected?
   
• Vendor Analysis - Efficiency and effectiveness ratings for all third-party vendors, including their ability to scale up to meet new targets. Evaluation of current contracts and relationships.

Technology - The information requirements of 21^st century staffing will only be satisfied by powerful, up to date technology. A three-year-old ATS or a two-year-old job site will not get the job done. Older systems simply cannot effectively manage and integrate:

• Advertising, job posting and applicant tracking
• Interviews, assessments, dynamic scheduling and on-boarding
• Career portals and internal mobility
• Social media, mobile device applications and CRM
• Predictive analytics, workforce planning and succession planning Performance, learning and competency management.

In the traditional model, everyone had the same tools and systems. The main differentiator was the skill level of individual recruiters. In the future model, hardware and software will increasingly determine results. Superior people will still be crucial, but the medals will go to those with access to the most capable technology.

Welcome to the world of 21^st century staffing: one where the map is being rapidly redrawn. It’s unquestionably a data-centered, technology-driven world, one dependent on the same decision-making analytics that are common in finance, sales, R & D, or manufacturing. The performance bar is higher, but there is also a demonstrated impact on corporate performance.

Our research shows that the performance bell curve in corporate staffing is flattening, and as it does, the gap between poor practice and good practice is widening. Top performing departments are hiring better candidates at lower cost, in less time, keeping them longer and deploying them more productively. Fortunately the new model is available to all. Many changes are inexpensive and more than offset by savings realized through lower turnover, lower vacancy costs and better corporate performance.

(This article is an excerpt from our soon-to-be published  Corporate Recruiting Report, formerly named the Recruiting Metrics & Performance Benchmark Report. It is being offered at a special pre-publication price. Please visit our store.)